What does 'now-now' mean to you?
A proudly South African term that only South Africans get...
As South Africans, we have our very own way of speaking with one another. You might call it the language of 'South Africanisms'.
This language contains terms understood across our land, and the meaning behind each term is bespoke of our country's people.
For instance, 'Ek se', 'Aita', 'Lekker', and 'Now-Now' are just part of our vocabulary as South Africans. But foreigners who find our lingo a tad bit confusing may miss these phrases.
We have seen a few videos from foreigners living in South Africa discussing the nature of our people and, more importantly, the way we speak.
A mother who wanted to set the record straight shared a short but sweet video on what the term 'now-now' means.
She didn't go into specifics, but she merely explained that she asked her toddler what time he would like to eat dinner, and the little boy replied, 'now-now.'
Her interpretation was simple: He wanted his food now, in other words, in fifteen minutes or so. The fact that a toddler can understand this sense of time based on South African time and culture makes us beam with pride.
The people of Mzansi shared their understanding of the term; check out some of their comments:
- "Now now means in a few."
- "Yes...In SA ,Shem means ,oh I feel sorry for you. Now now means about 15 minutes."
- "Fully Understood."
- "actually majority of the people in southern Africa would get that."
Watch how she explained it in her video on TikTok.
@mommytayo_ Its a SA 🇿🇦 thing 🤷🏼♀️ Seen so many videos of the now/ just now/ now now time saga… It makes sense to us okay!😂 #proudlysouthafrican🇿🇦 #southafricantiktok #momsoftiktok #interculturalfamily #toddlerboymom #toddlerchats #thingsmytoddlersays #funnythingskidsdo ♬ TOO SWEET X RIVERS BY ALTÉGO - ALTÉGO
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Image Courtesy of TikTok